Another of my friends died last night. His name was Pete Hudson, and he developed a brain tumor 17 years ago, when he was only 24, which was before we even met (in the Robertson Davies Memorial Bookgroup). So he'd been a survivor of major health issues the whole time I knew him, and he always seemed pretty healthy, so somehow the tumor had become neutered in my mind, sapped of its destructiveness, drained of its power over life and death. I know it sounds incredibly stupid, but it had never occurred to me that Pete might die. He was only a year older than *me*, for goodness sake!

Our only contact over the last several years was on Facebook, but just as he'd been in person, he always seemed upbeat. I knew that his cancer had returned and that he was undergoing treatment, but people survive cancer treatment every day ... and he'd done it before! Okay, so my dad's example wasn't so encouraging, but Pete was different. I hadn't seen him active on Facebook in the past few months, but the last posts I'd seen had seemed optimistic, and sometimes people just don't post on Facebook for a while, you know? It doesn't mean you should jump to conclusions. I just figured he was busy.

I found out about his death rather shockingly by reading a mutual friend's comment on Facebook this morning, in which she referred to making a donation to the American Brain Tumor Association in honor of his memory. It hit me pretty hard. I mean, Pete and I were never close, but I liked him and had no idea of the situation.

I've been thinking about Rory Root (a friend who died in May 2008) a lot lately, because his world-renowned comic bookstore (Comic Relief) has been somewhat in the news recently, as it closed down last month, and so the death of friends feels suddenly omnipresent in my life. Rory's death shocked me, too, despite the fact that he'd been having serious health problems for quite some time. I mean ... he was *Rory*! Nothing was going to happen to him! So Pete's death feels somewhat the same.

Well, I'm very sorry to hear the news about Pete, and I wish I'd been in closer contact with him, as he was always very friendly and kind to me, and he often made me laugh.